Slither, Flutter and Glow: Lure of Nocturnal Creatures

A light from Mike Feller, the city’s chief naturalist, revealed an orb-weaver spider and its catch, a dobsonfly, on a web in Alley Pond Park in Queens this month.Credit
Joshua Bright for The New York Times

Mike Feller directed his headlamp toward a fallen log. A dot of green beamed back, the telltale eyeshine. It was coming from a fishing spider, an arachnid known for its multiple eyes, considerable girth (two inches in diameter) and speed of movement.

“It’s the largest spider you’re likely to find in the forest of New York City,” Mr. Feller said, moving in for a closer look. “It’s almost like our tarantula.”

Note to self: You know a spider is big when its eyes reflect light like a deer or opossum.

It was a steamy, still night in Alley Pond Park, in Queens, and Mr. Feller, New York City’s chief naturalist, was in his element, listening to the comb-scratching song of the katydids and looking for anything that slithered or fluttered or scurried. Most people venture into the woods by day, but Mr. Feller likes the singular experience of a nocturnal foray, when wildlife that resides in hollow logs and under leaves comes out of hiding.

Over the years, he has led night hikes and owl prowls for the city’s parks department. Every so often, however, he strikes out on his own. Alley Pond Park’s 657 acres are home to owls, flying squirrels, raccoons and foxes, but he mostly finds less-complex creatures, like slugs, spiders, moths, crickets and beetles. Mr. Feller admits that at one time such creatures made him recoil, but he overcame his anxiety by taking a course in entomology. “There does seem to be something prewired in our subconscious to be afraid of insects,” he said.

Mr. Feller, a stocky Brooklyn native with a close-cropped beard, has a special tool kit for these outings. In addition to his headlamp, flashlight and camera, he usually brings a batch of “moth sugar” — a homemade brew of rotten peaches, bananas, molasses and a shot of bourbon — to help attract insects. Other lures include a white sheet, which he drapes between two trees, and a black light.

As the last traces of daylight faded behind the oak, hickory and tulip trees, Mr. Feller, 54, squatted at the edge of the woods, the thrum of the Cross Island Parkway audible in the distance, and flicked his flashlight on and off. He was trying to communicate with a sprinkling of lightning bugs along the forest floor, participants in a luminescent mating ritual.

“There’s a female low to the ground, but she stays stationary,” he said quietly. “The males are flying and vying for the females. The male flashes, and if the female is impressed with the flash, she pulses back and then he comes closer.”

Mr. Feller moved deeper in the woods, walking briskly away from the traffic noise, turning left and right, going down makeshift steps and up to a clearing. He set up the sheet and then dipped a paintbrush in the moth sugar and slathered it on a half-dozen trees. Then he waited.

Photo

Mr. Feller ventured out on a night hike with a batch of "moth sugar" and other lures to attract insects.Credit
Joshua Bright for The New York Times

“It’s just about night now,” he said, shining a light on a tree trunk. “A lot of the nocturnal insects have two-hour shifts. They wake up and crawl up the trunk to the canopy to eat leaves or insects and then go back to the ground. It’s like riding the elevator at work and passing the night shift while you’re going down.”

Something darted past. “Did you see that?” he asked. “It was either a bat or a flying squirrel.”

As the outlines of the forest receded and the chatter of insects thickened, Queens seemed to metamorphose from a borough teeming with 2.2 million people to one crawling with invertebrates, from a county whose two airports give it the most crowded air space in the nation to one dominated by gossamer wings. “Midsummer is the most exuberant time,” Mr. Feller said. “By September, it’s starting to wane.”

He returned to one of his syrupy tree trunks and discovered a small wood roach. “It’s a beautiful chestnut color,” he said. “This is the local native forest cockroach that would hate to be in your house. If you brought it back to your kitchen, it would run for the hills.”

Note to self: Leave cockroach in the woods where it is happy.

Nearby was an orb-weaver spider, which is part of the sprawling Araneidae family, with thousands of species. Orb-weavers, as their name implies, are known for their intricate wheel-shape webs, and this spider, with a bulging abdomen, was waiting for dinner. Suddenly, a giant dobsonfly crashed into its web. The spider seemed unsure what to do, as the aquatic insect — its mandibles gnawing furiously — struggled to free itself.

“If the spider wants it, it will move in on the fly and bite it with its fangs,” Mr. Feller said. “The fangs inject a venom that paralyzes the fly.” Just as the orb-weaver went in for the kill, the dobsonfly flew off, leaving a large hole in the web.

Over by the sheet, a multitude of insects swarmed in the lavender glow of the black light, including Ailanthus webworms, caddis flies and crickets. The showstopper was a longhorn beetle, a finger-length native and not, fortunately, the invasive Asian longhorn that has infested trees in the city. “This guy is usually in the leaf litter,” Mr. Feller said.

It was getting late, but Mr. Feller could not resist a last look at a trunk painted with moth sugar. His reward was an enormous camel cricket, a member of the family Rhaphidophoridae, that was wallowing in the sticky bait. Sometimes called cave crickets, camels are a plague of suburban basements, but they prefer the cool, damp habitat of logs, stumps and actual caves. Mr. Feller marveled at the cricket’s heft. “It almost looks like you could pop the meat out like a crawfish and eat it with melted butter,” he mused.

Note to self: Stick with lobster.

A version of this article appears in print on August 13, 2012, on page A13 of the New York edition with the headline: Slither, Flutter and Glow: Lure of Nocturnal Wildlife. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe